The art world is predominantly a relationship-driven business. You need to have relationships and trust; you need to build a brand for a start-up. A lot of the investors and partners behind art-based start-ups allow them to have those relationships. Ultimately, the goal of many art-based start-ups is to make art very accessible and remove a lot of the elitism that currently perpetuates the art world — all the intimidation, all the negative emotions. They want art to be as ubiquitous and a part of our culture as music is today. Music used to be something that was only for a select few in society. With the record player, the radio, the internet — once everybody has access to it, it was no longer a big deal. All that matters is the music itself, your enjoyment of it, and talking about it with your friends. These start-ups see art becoming the same way. It won’t be about who’s who or any other superficial stuff that has a lot of people feeling unwelcome. Paddle8 and Art.sy are two of the more well-established start-ups in the NYC scene.

Paddle8

30 Cooper Square
New York, NY 10003

www.paddle8.com

www.facebook.com/Paddle8

@paddle8

Paddle8 comes from the entrepreneur, Aditya Julka’s experience as a new collector buying art from intimidating galleries but craving the type of community they can engender. “[The world of art auctions] can be very clubby and esoteric,” says Alexander Gilkes (the co-founder of Paddle8). The site aims to educate, and welcome collectors to the club—and maybe loosen up the art world along the way.

The site’s look and feel feels a bit more egalitarian than some of Chelsea’s frostier galleries. Playful quotes are matched with dynamic displays of artworks, which are photographed at extremely high-resolution to afford close inspection.

Art.sy

401 Broadway, Floor 25
New York, NY 10013

www.artsy.net

www.facebook.com/Artsy

@artsy

According to founder, Carter Cleveland, Art.sy want to be the platform for art. What can you do with art? You can learn about it, you can read about it, you can write about it, you can buy it and you can sell it. Art.sy just wants to be the platform that enables all of these activities.

For a recent video interview with Carter, follow this link: http://www.forbes.com/video/2965951863001/

This start-up want to make all the world’s art freely accessible to anyone with an internet connection. They work with galleries, museums, and artists’ estates to get their art online, making it easily accessible to everyone around the world, and also creating an educational context. If there is an artwork or an artist, and you want to understand the historical context around them, you can do that using all the metadata Art.sy have added through The Art Genome Project.

Artsy wants to make the art market a lot bigger and more efficient. When people are passionate about art that leads to people buying art. The only way to really help more artists is to fundamentally increase the demand; it’s not a supply issue, it’s a demand issue. It also means that a lot more artists will be able to pursue their passions more sustainably.